A man seals mouth with a branded sticker reading “Bring Back Our Girls Now” to campaign for the release of the kidnapped Chibok schoolgirls during a rally in the Nigerian capital Abuja on October 14, 2014. AFP PHOTO/PIUS UTOMI EKPEI (Photo credit should read PIUS UTOMI EKPEI/AFP/Getty Images)

YOLA/ABUJA, Oct 23 (Reuters) – Suspected Boko Haram militants kidnapped at least 25 girls in an attack on a remote town in northeastern Nigeria, witnesses said, despite talks on freeing over 200 other female hostages they seized in April.

John Kwaghe, who witnessed the attack and lost three daughters to the abductors, and Dorathy Tizhe, who lost two, said the kidnappers came late in the night, forcing all the women to go with them, then later releasing the older ones.

The attack cast further doubt on government reports that it has secretly reached a temporary ceasefire with the rebels in order to secure the release of more than 200 schoolgirls they are holding hostage.

“We are confused that hours after the so-called ceasefire agreement has been entered between the Federal Government and Boko Haram insurgents, our girls were abducted by the insurgents,” Kwaghe said.

“We urge the government to please help rescue our daughters without further delay, as we are ready to die searching.”

Nearly a week after the government announced a ceasefire deal with Boko Haram, which it said would include the release of the girls kidnapped from the secondary school in Chibok in northeastern Nigeria in April, there is still no sign of them being freed.

Talks to release the schoolgirls are taking place this week between the government and a Boko Haram representative in the Chadian capital N’Djamena, but they are shrouded in secrecy.

CEASEFIRE DOUBTS

In a separate attack, a bomb exploded late on Wednesday at a bus station in the town of Azare in northern Nigeria’s Bauchi state, killing at least five people and wounding 12, police said. They did not comment on who was behind the attack, although Boko Haram is likely to be the prime suspect.

The insurgents have repeatedly bombed public places since launching an uprising demanding an Islamic state in religiously mixed Nigeria five years ago. They have stepped up their campaign this year, setting off deadly blasts across the country that killed hundreds.

They have killed many thousands and are increasingly targeting civilians in violence seen as the biggest threat to the stability of Africa’s biggest economy and top oil producer.

“The entire surrounding (area) has been cordoned off … No arrest has yet been made, but an investigation has commenced.”

The increasing attacks have raised doubts over the ceasefire, although Boko Haram is so factionalised it is possible a truce has been reached with one group while others continue with violence.

A Chadian diplomat told Reuters that a deal could still be reached if this faction has ultimate control over the girls — although analysts say that they could be divided between several cooperating factions.

Boko Haram, which only communicates messages via jihadist videos of a man claiming to be its leader Abubakar Shekau, has not yet commented on the alleged ceasefire. (Reporting by Isaac Abrak; Writing by Tim Cocks; Editing by Bate Felix and Tom Heneghan)

“This is a spectacular success story,” Rui Gama Vaz, a WHO representative, said during a news conference.

“It shows that Ebola can be contained but we must be clear that we have only won a battle. The war will only end when West Africa is also declared free of Ebola.”

The first case of Ebola was imported to Nigeria when Patrick Sawyer, a Liberian-American diplomat, collapsed in a Lagos airport in July. There have been no new cases of the disease in Nigeria in 42 days, which is the minimum length of time required to declare an “official” end to an outbreak (twice the 21-day incubation period for the virus).

“Nigeria was not really prepared for the outbreak, but the swift response from the federal government, state governments (and) international organisations … was essential,” said Samuel Matoka, Ebola operations manager in Nigeria for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC).

Nigeria’s ‘Best Practices’

Government and health officials hope that the success in Nigeria can be a blueprint for other countries in how to combat Ebola. The WHO outlines what was done to stop the spread of Ebola in Nigera:

Strong leadership and resources

The most critical factor is leadership and engagement from the head of state and the Minister of Health. Generous allocation of government funds and their quick disbursement helped as well. Partnership with the private sector was yet another asset that brought in substantial resources to help scale up control measures that would eventually stop the Ebola virus dead in its tracks.

State-of-the-art equipment

Another key asset was the country’s first-rate virology laboratory affiliated with the Lagos University Teaching Hospital. That laboratory was staffed and equipped to quickly and reliably diagnose a case of Ebola virus disease, which ensured that containment measures could begin with the shortest possible delay.

High-quality contact tracing

In addition, high-quality contact tracing by experienced epidemiologists expedited the early detection of cases and their rapid movement to an isolation ward, thereby greatly diminishing opportunities for further transmission.

House-to-house information campaigns and messages on local radio stations, in local dialects, were used to explain the level of risk, effective personal preventive measures and the actions being taken for control. On his part, the President reassured the country’s vast and diversified population through appearances on nationally televised newscasts.

The full range of media opportunities was exploited – from social media to televised facts about the disease delivered by well-known “Nollywood” movie stars.

Use of proven measures from previous outbreaks

When the first Ebola case was confirmed in July, health officials immediately repurposed polio technologies and infrastructures to conduct Ebola case-finding and contact-tracing.

The use of cutting-edge technologies, developed with guidance from the WHO polio programme, put GPS systems to work as support for real-time contact tracing and daily mapping of links between identified chains of transmission.

Margaret Chan, WHO Director, is optimistic other affected areas can replicate Nigeria’s methods. “If a country like Nigeria, hampered by serious security problems, can do this … any country in the world experiencing an imported case can hold onward transmission to just a handful of cases.”

Pistorius, 27, did not dispute that he shot and killed Steenkamp. However, Pistorius argued that he believed she was an intruder when he shot her through a locked bathroom door at his home in Pretoria in the early-morning hours of Feb. 14, 2013.

Pistorius rose to fame by competing in running events while wearing the blade-like prosthetics that gave him his nickname, “Blade Runner.” In 2012, he became the first amputee to compete in an Olympic track event, running in two events in the 2012 Summer Games in London.

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story stated that Pistorius had been given a suspended sentence. He was sentenced to 5 years in prison for the count of culpable homicide, and 3 years suspended for the firearms count.

A burial team in protective gear bury the body of woman suspected to have died from Ebola virus in Monrovia, Liberia. Saturday, Oct, 18, 2014. The death toll from Ebola will rise this week to more than 4,500 people from the 9,000 infected and the outbreak is still out of control in three West African nations, a top official with the U.N. health agency said (AP Photo/Abbas Dulleh)

KIGALI, Rwanda (AP) — Rwanda’s Ministry of Health is requiring visitors who have been in the United States or Spain during the previous 22 days to report their medical condition to health authorities upon arrival in Rwanda, the U.S. Embassy in Rwanda said Tuesday.

A Ministry of Health document says all passengers from the U.S. and Spain – two countries that have seen cases of Ebola – will have temperatures taken upon arrival. Passengers with fevers will be denied entry, and those without fevers will still be required to report daily health conditions.

Dr. Agnes Binagwaho, Rwanda’s health minister, said Tuesday that travelers from the U.S. and Spain will be required to fill a detailed form upon arrival at border entry points.

“It is definitely extra work for us. We have to ensure that all citizens or any other travelers arriving from the above mentioned countries including the U.S have to be screened in an extra careful manner and follow up on them during their stay,” Bingwaho said.

No Ebola cases have been reported in Rwanda. The U.S. Embassy said that Rwanda is not allowing visitors who have recently traveled to Guinea, Liberia, Senegal, or Sierra Leone, though the incoming health form advises those traveling from those countries must also report health conditions daily.

Rwanda has quarantined 30 people since the Ebola outbreak. No U.S. citizens have been quarantined. One German national has been quarantined.

It can be exhausting nursing a child through a nasty bout with the flu, so imagine how 22-year-old Fatu Kekula felt nursing her entire family through Ebola.

Her father. Her mother. Her sister. Her cousin. Fatu took care of them all, single-handedly feeding them, cleaning them and giving them medications.

And she did so with remarkable success. Three out of her four patients survived. That’s a 25% death rate — considerably better than the estimated Ebola death rate of 70%.

Fatu stayed healthy, which is noteworthy considering that more than 300 health care workers have become infected with Ebola, and she didn’t even have personal protection equipment — those white space suits and goggles used in Ebola treatment units.

Instead Fatu, who’s in her final year of nursing school, invented her own equipment. International aid workers heard about Fatu’s “trash bag method” and are now teaching it to other West Africans who can’t get into hospitals and don’t have protective gear of their own.

Every day, several times a day for about two weeks, Fatu put trash bags over her socks and tied them in a knot over her calves. Then she put on a pair of rubber boots and then another set of trash bags over the boots.

She wrapped her hair in a pair of stockings and over that a trash bag. Next she donned a raincoat and four pairs of gloves on each hand, followed by a mask.

It was an arduous and time-consuming process, but Fatu was religious about it, never cutting corners.

UNICEF Spokeswoman Sarah Crowe said Fatu is amazing.

“Essentially this is a tale of how communities are doing things for themselves,” Crowe said. “Our approach is to listen and work with communities and help them do the best they can with what they have.”

She emphasized, of course, that it would be better for patients to be in real hospitals with doctors and nurses in protective gear — it’s just that those things aren’t available to many West Africans.

No one knows that better than Fatu.

Her Ebola nightmare started July 27, when her father, Moses, had a spike in blood pressure. She took him to a hospital in their home city of Kakata.

A bed was free because a patient had just passed away. What no one realized at the time was that the patient had died of Ebola.

Moses, 52, developed a fever, vomiting and diarrhea. Then the hospital closed down because nurses started dying of Ebola.

Fatu took her father to Monrovia, the capital city, about a 90-minute drive via difficult roads. Three hospitals turned him away because they were full.

She took him back to another hospital in Kakata. They said he had typhoid fever and did little for him, so Fatu took him home, where he infected three other family members: Fatu’s mother, Victoria, 57; Fatu’s sister, Vivian, 28, and their 14-year-old cousin who was living with them, Alfred Winnie.

While operating her one-woman Ebola hospital for two weeks, Fatu consulted with their family doctor, who would talk to her on the phone, but wouldn’t come to the house. She gave them medicines she obtained from the local clinic and fluids through intravenous lines that she started.

At times, her patients’ blood pressure plummeted so low she feared they would die.

But her father, mother, and sister rallied and were well on their way to recovery when space became available at JFK Medical Center on August 17. Alfred never recovered, though, and passed away at the hospital the next day.

“I’m very, very proud,” her father said. “She saved my life through the almighty God.”

Now he’s working to find a scholarship for Fatu so she can finish her final year of nursing school. He has no doubt his daughter will go on to save many more people during her life.

“I’m sure she’ll be a great giant of Liberia,” he said.

CNN’s John Bonifield, Orlando Ruiz, and Orlind Cooper contributed to this story.

Fighters of Libya’s Fajr Libya (Libyan Dawn) drive their pick up truck mounted with a machine gun near a burnt car, south of the town of Wershfana on October 13, 2014, some 30 kilometres west of the Libyan capital Tripoli. Wershefana saw clashes between Fajr Libya mainly Islamist alliance with gunmen accused of being loyal to the former regime of slain dictator Moamar Kadhafi. AFP PHOTO / MAHMUD TURKIA (Photo credit should read MAHMUD TURKIA/AFP/Getty Images)

US singer-songwriter Alicia Keys (C) shouts slogans as she joins protesters with the “Bring Back Our Girls” campaign during a demonstration in front of the Nigerian consulate in New York on October 14, 2014 AFP PHOTO/Jewel Samad (Photo credit should read JEWEL SAMAD/AFP/Getty Images)

NEW YORK (AP) — Alicia Keys held a protest in New York City on Tuesday to raise awareness about the 200-plus Nigerian schoolgirls who were kidnapped by Boko Haram militants in April.

Tuesday marked six months since the girls were abducted. Keys kicked off a protest with 30 others at the consulate general of Nigeria, holding signs that read “We Are Here” and “Safe Schools Now!”

They chanted “Bring back our girls” and “When do we want them? Now! Now! Alive!” as New Yorkers walked up the street during lunch hour, while others stopped to capture photos and video.

Keys, who is pregnant, said in an interview that she felt touched to take action because she is a mother. Her son, Egypt, turned 4 on Tuesday.

“Today is my son’s birthday and it is also making me stand in solidarity with all the mothers of the Chibok girls who have been abducted for six months and are still missing. And it is just outrageous that that’s going on,” the 33-year-old said as others chanted behind her.

Keys recently launched the movement “We Are Here,” which fights for social justice. She also recorded and released a song with the same name.

She was joined by her husband, producer-rapper Swizz Beatz. She said people need a reminder that the schoolgirls are still missing.

“Some people have even told me they’ve heard things about `there’s been progress,’ but there hasn’t been progress because the girls aren’t back,” Keys said. “So I think that we get mixed information. We don’t know, so we just have to keep being made aware of what’s happening.”

Entry screenings at five airports for travelers entering the United States from Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone will be increased by two federal agencies to detect the Ebola virus, which has caused large numbers of infections and deaths in those countries.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Homeland Security’s Customs & Border Protection (CBP) announced on Wednesday new layers of screening for JFK International Airport in New York, Newark Airport in Newark, N.J., O’Hare International Airport in Chicago, Hartsfield-Jackson Airport in Atlanta and Washington-Dulles Airport.

Centers for Disease Control officials made the announcement, following the death of Thomas Eric Duncan, a 42-year-old Ebola patient from Liberia. Duncan died on Wednesday in Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, where he had been a patient since Sept. 28.

His body will be treated as hazardous and handled only by specially trained personnel, wearing protective gear. He will be cremated.

In the 12 months ending in July 2014, JFK received nearly half of the travelers from the three West African countries. Enhanced screening at JFK will begin on Saturday. The increased screenings at Washington-Dulles, Newark, O’Hare and Atlanta international airports will start next week. Over 94 percent of travelers from the three countries enter the U.S. through the five airports.

The World Health Organization, which is based in Geneva, reported in June that there were more than 600 cases of Ebola and over 390 deaths in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

The often fatal virus is transmitted from wild animals and spreads in the human population through human-to-human transmission, according to the World Health Organization.

“We work continuously to increase the safety of Americans,” said Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the CDC. “We believe these new measures will further protect the health of Americans, understanding nothing we can do will get us to absolute zero risk until we end the Ebola epidemic in West Africa.”Jeh Johnson, secretary of Homeland Security, said CBP personnel will continue to observe all travelers entering the United States for general overt signs of illness at all U.S. ports of entry.

Travelers from the three West African countries will be escorted to area set aside for screening. CBP staff will observe individuals for signs of illness. Medical personnel will take their temperatures with a non-contact thermometer. If a traveler has a fever, which may reveal a possible Ebola virus, he or she will be evaluated by a public health officer in a CDC quarantine station.

Washington, DC — World Bank President Jim Yong Kim has warned that said unless the Ebola epidemic in West Africa is quickly contained, the future of Africa is at stake

Speaking at a meeting on the Ebola crisis with the presidents of the three affected countries- Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone in Washington DC yesterday, Kim said the epidemic had already infected more than 8,033 people, claimed more than 3,879 lives and continues to spread rapidly.

“The Ebola crisis has already had a profound impact on the millions of people in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone.

People are going hungry and are unable to go to work. At least six million children are unable to go to school, and thousands have been orphaned. Many businesses have shut down, farmers are unable to harvest their crops. Flights are being cancelled, trade has diminished”, he said.

According to Kim, growth projections for 2014 in the three most-affected countries have already been cut significantly. Just yesterday, the World Bank Group released a new economic impact assessment that says if the epidemic is not quickly contained and was to significantly infect people in neighbouring countries, the region would lose $32.6 billion by the end of 2015.

“This is a potentially catastrophic impact”, he said, adding, “Earlier in the week, we had a patient die of Ebola here in America, and now at least one infected nurse in Spain. We are likely to see more cases in more countries. Over the past month, we’ve seen a stepped up global response with support from a number of countries and organizations at this table.”

Kim lamented: ‘We are still way behind the curve, and we have to quickly speed up and scale up the global response to this crisis”.

BANGUI, Central African Republic (AP) — Clashes in Central African Republic’s capital have resulted in “many casualties,” the International Committee for the Red Cross said Thursday, marking the most significant violence in the city since a United Nations force took over peacekeeping last month.

The violence complicated relief efforts. Doctors Without Borders said its staff was staying home Thursday because of the dangers, and the ICRC said its workers “were subjected to direct threats” as they tried to recover bodies.

“It’s truly regrettable that such actions can jeopardize any attempt to help the wounded,” said Antoine Mbao Bogo, the national president of the Central African Red Cross. His organization provided an initial tally of 12 deaths, but staffers did not have access to all neighborhoods.

The violence began Tuesday when a former fighter with a mostly Muslim Seleka rebel coalition was killed by anti-Balaka Christian militias who mutilated his body before burning it, witnesses said.

The man had been accused of launching two grenades, one in an anti-Balaka stronghold in the north of the city, prompting the anti-Balaka fighters to chase after him.

“He was chased by anti-Balaka fighters who caught him, killed him and burned his body,” Bangui resident Wilfried Maitre said.

Reprisal attacks ensued, with Muslim fighters killing two people, including the driver of a taxi, witnesses said. Other taxi drivers then staged a protest, raising tensions.

Later on Wednesday, anti-Balaka fighters paraded through the streets, showing off their weapons and shooting into the air, said Pieterjan Wouda of Doctors Without Borders. “That’s something we haven’t seen in a long time,” he said.

Heavy weapons could be heard Thursday morning, Wouda said, adding that Doctors Without Borders staff would be staying home because it was not safe to move around.

The mostly Muslim Seleka rebel coalition toppled the president of a decade last year, installing their chief, Michel Djotodia, as the country’s new leader. Widespread human rights abuses combined with escalating violence in the capital in December and January led to Djotodia’s resignation.

The country is currently headed by transitional President Catherine Samba-Panza.

At least 5,000 people have died over nine months of sectarian violence in the country. The International Crisis Group warned last month that the transition was at risk of falling apart.

“The main armed groups are in disarray, lack clear leadership, seek to expand their areas of control and pursue banditry as much as politics,” the group warned.